The Fragility of Bodies

by Sergio Olguin

  “How do you know?”

  “I found out. It’s vital that you warn the other drivers and, better still, get them to stop the trains.”

  “That’s impossible. So those fucking kids are going to be in front of my train today.”

  “It’s a mafia, Lucio. There are politicians, businessmen, important people involved in this. I know who’s finding the kids and how they get them there.”

  “Whereabouts are they going to be, Verónica?”

  “I haven’t been able to find that out.”

  Verónica, Verónica, Verónica, Verónica, Verónica. Speaking her name, he felt desire all over again. He heard her speak and all he wanted was to have her in his arms.

  “You were the one who put me on to this.”

  “For good, or bad?”

  “For good. Knowing you has been for good, Lucio. Call me when you get to Plaza Once.”

  “Vero, I want to see you.”

  “Lucio.”

  “Seriously. I mean it.”

  “Call me when you get to the terminal. And be on your guard.”

  They ended their conversation as the train reached Morón. So the death trains and Verónica had been brought together again. That secret life where Verónica’s body coexisted with the bodies crushed on the line presented itself to Lucio once more as what it was: reality. His dreamworld was somewhere else. The dream was his wife, his children, the routines he loved, his friends, playing soccer with people from work. The dream was believing that life could bring peace. The reality was an intense, unique and unrepeatable moment, as each encounter with Verónica and as every collision with a person he knocked down had been. By contrast, dreams evaporated, became intermingled. Mariana, his children, the house where they lived were intangible and became shapeless in his life. What remained was Verónica, desiring Verónica, having her here with him. What remained were the trains from which he could never step down, the accidents which never ended.

  He thought of calling his co-workers on other trains to warn them about what was going to happen that night, but he didn’t get the chance. As always, he saw them too late – perhaps this time even a little later than usual. Two boys staring at him, their bodies rigid as they prepared to wait until the last possible moment.

  He didn’t sound the horn. Instinctively he braked, clenching his teeth as if that could help the train to stop. For the first time that night, he closed his eyes, something that he had never done before any other accident. The train screeched like a pig being slaughtered. Shouts and cries could be heard coming from the compartments in response to the sudden application of brakes. Nothing else. There was no sound of bodies hitting iron. He didn’t feel bones grinding underneath his driver’s cabin. The two boys had managed to jump in time.

  Terror gave way to hatred. Lucio climbed blindly down from the cabin. Through the night’s darkness, slightly illuminated by light coming from the compartments, he saw a boy get to his feet and run away. Without thinking or caring that he was leaving his passengers stranded there, he went after the boy. All he could see was that small body jumping nimbly over the sleepers between the rails. The boy was fast, but Lucio’s fury gave him extra energy. The train was behind them and Lucio began to close the distance between him and the boy. Finally, the kid’s legs gave out, he stumbled, and Lucio grabbed him by the shoulder. The effort sent both of them falling onto the tracks. The boy tried to wriggle away.

  “Stop moving, you little bastard.”

  “Please, señor, don’t kill me.”

  He must have been about ten or eleven, just a few years older than Lucio’s boys. But when he chased them it was for fun – he’d throw himself on top of them, all three of them laughing. Just as when you wake up from a pleasant dream and try to return to it by squeezing your eyes closed, Lucio wished he could be at home playing with his children. But the dream didn’t come back. He was still there, looking at a child who was staring at him, terrified.

  “I didn’t want to do it. Supergirl was going to get here in time so I didn’t have to jump.”

  “Super who?”

  “Verónica.”

  Was the kid mocking him?

  And what if this thing happening to him really was a nightmare? He was about to ask which Verónica – although he already knew the answer – when two figures stepped out of the shadows. One was dressed in sportswear and the other, absurdly, in a jacket and tie.

  “Let go of the boy,” the one wearing the Adidas kit ordered.

  Lucio looked at them. Immediately he understood everything.

  “You’re the pieces of shit who make these boys jump, right?”

  The boy had taken his chance to free himself and move further away, but he was still sitting on the ground. Lucio was kneeling.

  “You’re scum.”

  He wanted to stand up. He didn’t know what he would do next, beat up the men or look for a stone to throw at their heads. He did know that he wasn’t going back to the train, that he wouldn’t be driving it any further.

  Now the boy ran off, far away from them.

  “Get rid of him,” the man in the Adidas kit said to the other one.

  The other man took out a gun and pointed it at his face.

  Lucio closed his eyes. Something exploded.

  V

  Verónica hung up just as they were reaching the tollbooth at the Dolores Prats exit. She had been unsure about whether to call him for two reasons: the possibility that Lucio was at the moment contentedly eating dinner with his wife, and the fact that Federico would hear their conversation. Finally, she had decided to dial his number. Her hands were shaking and she no longer knew if that was because of all that had happened that day or simply because she was a foolish girl calling an ex-lover. Lucio wasn’t with his wife, but Federico had listened attentively to everything she had said, and perhaps he had also caught some of what Lucio said.

  “Do you always speak to your sources that way?”

  “Don’t be a moron.”

  She was being unfair to Federico. She should be nicer. Besides, he was right: it wasn’t the right way to treat a journalistic source.

  “I had a thing with him, but it’s over.”

  They were making slow progress along the narrow and congested avenue. Federico was doing what he could and had even crossed Avenida Gaona on a red light, just avoiding a collision with a van travelling away from the capital. They took the underpass, over which the Sarmiento railway ran, and reached Avenida Rivadavia, at which point they had to decide what direction to take.

  “Haedo or Morón?”

  “Haedo,” Verónica whispered. Her body was tense and she had an urge to piss; she was clenching her toes, something she did when she was hyper-alert.

  As they drove along beside the railway line, Verónica kept her gaze fixed out of that side of the car, watchful for a passing train or a crowd of people: the former would have been a sign that, at least for the moment, everything was under control. Since she was looking sideways, Federico was the one to sound the alarm.

  “Something’s happening up ahead.”

  The traffic was heavier here, and in the distance they could see a stalled train. Federico inched forward until he had drawn level with the first compartment, but on the other side of Avenida Rivadavia. The crossing was blocked because the train had come to a stop across it. From where they were, they could see that the driver’s cabin was empty. Federico made a dangerous manoeuvre, a U-turn that nearly caused him to crash into some of the cars going towards Morón. The people they could see standing in front of the first compartment looked confused, but this wasn’t a scene of panic. Verónica got out of the car and walked towards the tracks. There was no injured child to be seen; no train driver, either.

  She remembered what El Peque had told her: that when he was scared he ran away, that he ran along beside the train until he had left it behind him and that he met Rivero all the same. Verónica thought it probable that the boys had run back towards the station. And if R
ivero and his men were waiting for them, the meeting place would be at the next railway crossing. She ran back to the car.

  “Put your foot down, Fede, we’re going to the next crossing.”

  They drove on to the next barrier, then parked the car on Avenida Rivadavia. They got out and walked towards the poorly lit tracks. Even in the dark, they saw him coming. A boy. Dientes. Verónica ran towards him without even calling to him. She grabbed him and hugged him, feeling her eyes fill with tears.

  “Are you all right?”

  “I knew that you would come.”

  “And the other kid?” Federico asked.

  “He jumped. I didn’t see him after that.”

  “And Rivero?”

  “Rivero’s over there.” He pointed back towards the tracks, a dark area within which it was impossible to make out anything from where they stood. “He turned up with another guy when the man grabbed me.”

  “Which man?”

  “The driver, he was mad. He wanted to kill me. He grabbed me and threw me on the ground. Then Rivero and the other one turned up and I managed to escape. I got a fright when I heard the noises. They sounded like gunshots, but I don’t know. I thought that I was going to get killed, like my dad got killed.”

  “Take Dientes to the car and make sure Rivero doesn’t show up, because he’ll try to get him,” Verónica ordered Federico, and started walking towards the darkness. He took her by the arm.

  “You stay with the boy and I’ll go.”

  Verónica shook him off angrily. “I told you to go to the car and wait there!” she shouted, then ran towards the tracks.

  She didn’t need Dientes to know his name. Verónica was certain: the driver was Lucio. She was terrified that something had happened to him. She wanted to get somewhere and find Lucio there and for him to speak, to say anything. To feel that the most important thing was that they were there, that the worst was over, that the boys were safe and that he too, however furious and scared he was by what he had been through, was alive. He hadn’t run over anyone. He wasn’t going to see the children playing on the tracks any more. Lucio.

  She saw him on the ground. Lucio. He was lying across the tracks. He didn’t move, just as Marcelo had not moved earlier that same afternoon, and yet Marcelo was alive. Lucio was stretched out on the ground just like Rafael, who was now recuperating in hospital. Verónica put her arms around Lucio’s body and sat him up. She couldn’t look at his face, all covered in blood, but she hugged him tightly. She felt his body’s warmth, his blood, still wet, on her, and she spoke to him and cried and murmured unconnected phrases. Finally she looked at him, she looked at the destroyed face that was barely recognizable.

  “Don’t leave me. Don’t be an idiot. Don’t leave me.”

  It was a reproach she might have made on any other day when he was returning to his house, to the warmth of a home and a family. Lucio, don’t leave me. She would be naked, sitting on the bed. She would watch him get dressed. Lucio, don’t leave me. I love you. You know that I love you. Don’t leave me. And he would turn round, smiling, and kiss her. He would stay with her. Please don’t leave me. And they would listen to music or watch a movie together. In the end, happiness was that. The moment when a person decided not to leave. To stay with you.

  19  The Journalist’s Violent Calling

  I

  She stayed in the shower for at least twenty minutes, the water running over her neck, her glazed eyes, the foamless sponge in her hand. Stepping out of the bathtub, she wrapped her hair in a towel and dried her face. She rubbed her eyes and cheekbones hard. She didn’t have the energy to dry herself any more than that, but sheathed her wet body in a dressing gown and went to her bedroom. Robotically, she took the clothes she planned to wear from the wardrobe. She thought of heating up water for a coffee, but wanted to do as little as possible. Once she had dressed, she slid into her bag the envelope from Federico containing all that he knew about Juan García. She picked up her keys and left the apartment. It was ten to seven in the morning.

  In less than fourteen hours she had mown down four henchmen (two dead, two seriously injured), she had been in a police station and then a hospital, travelled to Haedo, had spoken to Lucio on the phone and had held his dead body on the tracks of the Sarmiento line. At that point she had lost all notion of time, but she did remember the police arriving soon afterwards along with Federico, who had left Dientes with a social worker from the child protection department.

  She had screamed at Federico when he tried to remove her from the scene. He had kept a firm hold on her and dragged her to the car. He even had to push her into it. They drove along the freeway without speaking, Verónica turning her back on him. She was sitting sideways in the seat, almost squatting, her head against the window.

  He went with her to her apartment. The building’s shattered frontage had been boarded up and a police officer was standing guard. Her father had already sent a locksmith to repair the door to the apartment and close off the balcony. Federico made her tea. They still didn’t speak. He made and received various phone calls. Dientes had been taken home and Jonathan located. They still knew nothing about the whereabouts of Rivero and his people.

  He insisted that she rest and try to sleep. He stayed until two o’clock in the morning, leaving only when she had promised that she would go to bed but that she wanted to be alone. Once Federico had gone, she turned on the computer and tried to put her material into some kind of order. Despite the involvement of official bodies, such as the police and a government agency, everything indicated that there had been no arrests. It was possible that those men would wait a long time before playing their sordid game again, or that they would simply move to a different railway. She had evidence that could implicate Rivero, including in Lucio’s death. But the guy could just spend the rest of his days as a fugitive, living under a different name in some far corner of the country – or even in Buenos Aires itself.

  From the balcony came the sound of birdsong announcing dawn. At first light, she began to feel cold. She decided to have a shower and start a new day.

  Outside the building, she stopped a taxi and gave the driver Juan García’s address in Palermo. Mentally she rehearsed what she had decided to do and say.

  The building had been constructed along modern lines. In place of a doorman, there were security men at the entrance whose appearance seemed to suggest the missing link between monkey and man. She asked for Juan García.

  “There’s no Juan García here.”

  “Don’t waste my time. I’m going to stand outside and smoke a cigarette on the sidewalk. You tell him that Verónica Rosenthal has come to talk to him about the German company Unmittelbare Zukunft. I’d better write it down for you. You can read, right?”

  She hadn’t finished the first cigarette when Missing Link called her. In the lobby was an older lady, over sixty, who proffered a professional smile. She invited Verónica to go with her.

  “I apologize for the security measures.”

  “There’s no need to apologize.”

  “All the same, Señor García has asked me not to take any particular precautions with you. That is why we didn’t ask for your ID at the entrance to the building. Nor are we going to check to see if you are wearing recording equipment.”

  “I feel I should be thanking you.”

  “Señor García will see you in a few minutes,” said the older lady, impervious to irony.

  She had to wait longer, this time, than she had waited outside. She wanted to smoke. The older lady reappeared and led her into an office. Behind the desk was Juan García.

  “My dear Rosenthal. I didn’t expect to see you so soon, or so early. You must be an early riser, like me.”

  He gestured at her to take a seat opposite him.

  “Here I am.”

  “I didn’t think that you would find this place, either. Your boys must be good. Congratulate them on my behalf.”

  “I’ve come to negotiate.”


  “I’m afraid that the time for negotiating has passed.”

  “Whereas I feel that it’s only just beginning.” She threw the envelope with the material Federico had given her down on the desk. Here is everything that links your business to the German firm Unmittelbare Zukunft. And the contacts with the agricultural machinery company in Misiones. And the relationship to people in Israel, Italy and Uruguay. There are also all the requests made by the Bavarian authorities as part of their investigation into money laundering. Up until now they haven’t managed to locate the local ringleader. Have a look, if you want.”

  Juan García gently pushed the envelope towards Verónica.

  “I don’t need to see it. There’s no denying you’re a good sniffer dog. I was going to say ‘bitch’, but it doesn’t sound right.”

  Verónica gave no reaction. García continued:

  “As a politician, I’m accustomed to rewarding people who make an effort. If we based our working and political relations on the level of effort made, we’d live in a better country. But I can see from your face that you’re not in the mood for a long chat, so tell me what you want.”

  “I want Palma, Rivero and the people who take part in the track-jumping contest.”

  “Oof, you’re asking for a lot. If you include everyone who places a bet as participants, that would mean implicating hundreds of people. It’s like soccer games, you see. Thousands go to the match and millions more watch on television. Something similar happens here. A few dozen people go along, and hundreds more follow on the internet.”

  “You record the contests?”

  “I’m not saying yes or no. But I’m surprised that a young girl like you wouldn’t think about how new technologies can be used. Right, so now I know what you’re asking for, but you haven’t said what you’ll give me in exchange.”

  “You won’t be mentioned in my article, not even as a suspect, not even in connection to the cases that took place in Misiones when you were mayor. I won’t do anything with the material that I have from Unmittelbare Zukunft. You and I won’t cross paths again, from the moment you give me what I want.”